Are you SICK of having to walk or run places like in a lot of 2d platformers? Are you TIRED of jumping and climbing cliffs, blocks, and literally everything else? In 6 Feet Under you won't be doing any of this! Kevin, the zombiegirl, rises from her grave and is trying to make it home so she can finally rest - what better way to do so than by turning into a drill?

If you haven't played this game so far, feel free to give it a try! We're always looking for more feedback and input on our entry.

If you HAVE played this game (and even if you haven't, actually) I'd like to announce our very first speedrun contest for 6 Feet Under. All you have to do is submit a youtube video as a comment on our game right here or on our itch.io page.

The rules are simple; too: - Play on our post-jam version. - Press F2 to toggle the speedrun timer. - Upload a video including the "Start"-press all the way to the end-screen - while having the speedrun timer run on the top left - on youtube - Share the video with us either as a comment on our game, either on LD or on itch.io, or hit me up on discord Kepsert#2230

This competition will run from the moment this blog post goes live till Sunday the 9th of May, 11pm, British time (midnight central European time, 6pm Eastern). Any run submissions after that deadline will not be valid for the competition.

But there's more!

I'll be sending out invites to 4 people (starting at the best times) to compete in a short single elimination tournament that will be livestreamed on Twitch, with a ~~potential~~ small prize pool as an incentive.

1st place: €20 Steam gift card.

2nd place: €10 Steam gift card.

3rd place: €5 Steam gift card.

Booby prize if you're among the top 4 but can't make it to the live races!

Grab our game and start drilling, y'all! We're looking forward to learning about your favorite speedrun strategies! LET'S GO!

A manual leaderboard will be added to both our itch and LD game descriptions.

Howdy, people of the interwebz! I'm one of the developers from 6 Feet Under, a 2d platformer with a TWIST. Zombiegirl Kevin rises from her grave. Dig, jump and gimmick her way back home so she can finally rest. A CHALLENGING 2d platformer, completely made in 1-bit (multiple palette options for the fans) and a little bit of a story in the ending. Download it here.

Besides that there's 2 things I'd like to share. Upon request we have decided to boot up an AWESOME community discord server. Discuss your best times, talk with the devs and be the first to hear about potential future versions! Join our discord here.

Last but not least, here's a reminder that our speedrun competition is still running for another 6 days! Set a good time and have a shot at winning a spot in the live 1v1 race bits and earn a shot at getting a small prize! More information here. Be aware, we have some good times set, already. Competition is LIT.

6 Feet Out.

6 Feet Under, the game where you help bring zombiegirl, Kevin, who has just risen from her grave, back home, so she can finally rest! (Download it through here)

First of all, I'd like to throw out one more welcome to all the kind and supportive comments y'all have left on our game. Even though we didn't find the time to reply to each comment, we do appreciate the comments highly and have built a collection of the kindest, the most amazing, but also the comments that hold feedback - which we'll definitely use in case there is going to be a full game later on. Thank you all for playing and rating our game! We also recently started a community discord for those interested; we currently have a speedrunning competition running, but you'll also find future announcements and different types of discussion channels on here. Feel free to join.

Now, for the actual development process.

DAY 1

It was 3am during the night when the games jam started. Personally, my very first LD. I had no idea what to expect. We agreed to have our very first meeting right as the games jam started. Luckily, I wasn't sleeping just yet so I was good to go... If it wasn't for me losing track of time cause I was stuck in a really intense round of Among Us (I watched my friend die in front of me).

Anyhow; I arrived in the discord call and the first step we took was to write down literally EVERYTHING we could think of related to the theme. It looked a bit like this:

We ended up with a google document with 2 full pages of relevant terms, synonyms and whatnot.

Once we were done, basically when we couldn't think of anything else, we decided to see which ones our team felt would be the most interesting. We put slashes behind the terms that stood out to each of us. When that was done, we scrolled through the list and took all the terms that had at least 2 slashes behind it.

Now, a new list, we started by deciding said terms where a main concept or like a subtheme. For example, someone found that blue is considered a deep color, but blue isn't necessarily a phrase you can use as a main concept - it is however a good subtheme for a game. Blue tints, characters, you get the idea I suppose. Our team also went through the list writing down things we imagined would fit with the chosen phrases and terms.

A small segment of this part of the process above. Once we had descriptions for each and every one of them, we went over them as a team, deciding which ones we were most interested in. We highlighted them and ended up with four main concepts for our game. Our final idea - 6 Feet Under - came from a necromancy idea we had - which initially was about a reverse grave digging management concept we had thought of. We talked some more about the necromancy/zombie theme and quickly game to a mechanic that seemed fun to everyone. Dig into dirt, get momentum when you dig out - angle yourself properly to get across a level. Once we were set and had an idea of what we'd be making, it was time for me to get a few hours of rest, while those who were in more pleasant timezones started working on the first proof of concept and the art.

TO BE CONTINUED...

6 Feet Under is a challenging 2d platformer with a twist in its mechanics. Completely made in 1-bit, multiple palette options, and a banger of a soundtrack. Zombiegirl Kevin rises from her grave - help her find her way home so she can finally rest. Download for free through here.

As we hopped by streams to have people try our game, and even outside of streams, one of the most surprising responses we have gotten was regarding the name of our favorite zombiegirl: Kevin. "Wait, Kevin's a girl?" "Her name's Kevin!?", things like this. When we were brainstorming our game, the idea, the concept, the mechanics, I decided I wanted to have a derpy zombie named Kevin - I figured it'd be a suiting name that'd work for what we'd be building. At this point we didn't quite know what our character would be like, besides that it'd be a zombie. Eventually, one of our teammates kept shouting "MAKE THEM CUTER" as our artist was working on the character. Eventually it turned into the zombiegirl as we released her in our games jam game - however we did not have a name. I personally liked Kevin, and didn't care about whether it's a common name for a girl or not; I continued calling her Kevin. Eventually, one of our programmers started using the name Kevin in the code as well - to the point where our team got conditioned to call our character Kevin and that's really how her name came to be.

What surprised me though; is that people seemed to be way more surprised by the fact we have a girl named Kevin in our game, than the fact that we have a zombie turning into a drill, traveling through random floating, layered, dirt blocks. I can only assume that this is because we are conditioned to normalize unrealistic levels in video games. For example, Mario having randomly floating coin blocks. We grow up with that stuff, just as we grow up to know Kevin as a male's name. The same thing applies to our game mechanic itself; it seems. People are so used to jump or climb over obstacles, we constantly kept getting a "WOW That's cool!" response as people found out the regular "jump"-button would instead drill them down into the dirt, rather than jumping up. It's amazing to see what kind of responses we got just by giving players something different than what they're used to.

What other surprises have you ran into throughout this games jam!? Please share your experiences!

By the way; 6 Feet Under has a community discord now, we have speedrunners, a fanarts/meme section and will post potential announcements/patch notes on there! Feel free to join!

6 Feet Under; the challenging 2d platformer where you are tasked to bring home zombiegirl Kevin so she can finally rest! And what better way to do this than the most conventional way called drilling? Drill, fly, angle yourself as you travel your way through randomly floating dirtblocks as you make your way through different hazards and gimmicks. Download for free through here.

Do you like going fast? Do you like drilling? Do you like flying across stages at MAXIMUM speed accompanied by a banger of a soundtrack? Then make sure to check into our speedrunning competition! While you're at the page linked above, make sure to check into the rules, there are only two days left! Set a top4 time within these 2 days and get invited to a live 1v1 race-off and earn your chance at a small prize! Current world record is just above 4 minutes, but sum of bests show that sub4 is definitely possible! Snatch that first place while you still can. Good luck!

More info can be found on our LD page linked above, but you're also free to join our community discord - whether you're interested in the speedrun competition or whether you'd just like to get involved with our game's community - discord includes devs, patch notes, possible announcements, memes and many more things! Join now!

Hey everybody! This LD will be the second time I'm participating in an LD, but the first time I'll be doing so by myself.

With that said, I feel like I have an important announcement to make:

Whatever this LD's theme will be, I will somehow incorporate giraffes into my product.

Thank you for reading this very important announcement.

Hello everybody!

The other day I announced that whatever the theme was going to be, I'd be incorporating giraffes. Today I'd like to update you all on the progress and show you a first look at my giraffe game.

They're not unicorns btw, they're giraffes.

Thank you for looking at my update. I wish you all a very pleasant Giraffe Dare.

Hello everybody!

I've returned to share an important notice on Giraffe o'Clock. Progress is going well, but the deadline is inevitable. Giraffes are moving, and soon will be dancing. There is now also an official summary for the game y'all have been waiting for:

Brother Billy is about to turn off the lights; it's bedtime after all. It just so happens to be that Kid Giraffe is scared of the dark and he's not quite ready for the lights to go off yet. Logically he goes on an adventure to delay, or perhaps completely evade, the inevitable. Meet a cast of characters through a jolly world of witty dialogue, adorable graphics, while transcending space and time in the one way that makes sense: through dance.

Adding a little robot and a wizardbat for reference!

Thank you for reading this very important notice.

Hello everybody,

I'm aware that nobody really says it, but we all want a giraffe game. Therefore I want to share with you this very timely update of Giraffe o'Clock (mechanics excluded to avoid spoilers).

Thank you for enjoying this update.

Hello everybody!

It's me again, I have bad news regarding Giraffe o'Clock. No, development is still going. But we have found spiders in our house. Please send help.

Thank you for reading this terrible update.

Hello everybody!

I'm back to share an alarming problem we have encountered. Evil wizard lady Carl has appeared in our home, she's throwing stars at us. How can a giraffe ever defeat this lady? By the way, we're aware everybody is waiting for a giraffe game, fear not, it's coming.

Thank you for reading this emergency update.

Hello everybody!

To celebrate our upcoming giraffe game, we're inviting all of you to a dance party. RSVP. Please bring giraffe fan art thank you.

Thank you for reading this invitation.

Hello everybody

I have come to share a special notice with everybody. You can now transcend space and time through a combination of platforming and dance. The giraffe game every needed.

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/50/giraffe-oclock

Thank you for noticing this special notice.

Hello everybody!

Today I want to share a short story on the process of Giraffe o'Clock. As I announced prior to the LD I was intent on making a giraffe game. And I'm a man of my words. At Saturday morning, 3am my time, I was up drawing giraffes on stream, no idea what I was going to do, when Sylbie randomly showed up and offered to make some improves to the sprites if I liked. And that's how we teamed up for this LD which was originally meant to be a solo-project.

Within no time not only my giraffe was better, but she also made many more cool characters!

Shoutout to Sylbie, she made amazing things! Follow her on Twitter, and play Giraffe o'Clock while at it.

Thank you for reading about this important friendship.

Hello everybody!

Your favourite giraffe game developer is here with another important announcement. Thanks to JavaSaurus' help, we now have a working web version of Giraffe o'Clock. Be careful though, volume is loud and there is no in-game volume slider yet! Please use your own volume mixer. (Keep in mind this is also a slight post-jam version, preferably not the one you'd use to rate our game)

Here's a moving picture of a moving giraffe.

Thank you for reading this important announcement.

Jokes aside. I just want to show you all a bit of what else to expect from Giraffe o'Clock.

Dank platforming:

Wholesome dialogue:

Giraffe o'Clock is where it's at.

Hey everybody!

So as most people who have played mentioned Giraffe o'Clock, the dialogue is extremely witty, funny, and full of puns. What are your favourite puns regarding time, clocks, and everything related to the space and time continuum?

This is just a pun sharing post by the way, not a "PLEASE PLAY MY GAME!"-type of post, but if you haven't played it yet you probably really should as it is now available in WebGL AND on Windows PCs and the music's slapping!

Thank you for reading my post.

Hey everybody!

I hope you like this post's title as it's both a literal soundtrack post, but it's also an adjective:

Anyway, people have been asking to share some of the Giraffe o'Clock soundtrack, so here you go! Click the soundcloud link above or the soundcloud link in this paragraph to check out our world 3 theme. This is the first time I ever focused on making music solely for a game and I am rather satisfied with the result! <3

Here is a GIF of our game to watch along with listening to the soundtrack. Enjoy! Might want to try playing Giraffe o'Clock yourself, too, if you haven't already. People say it's pretty cool!

Thank you for checking out this sound update.

Hello everybody!

I just wanted to drop a serious message. People have been asking how we came up with the concept of Giraffe o'Clock. The truth is, I had been struggling with depression for a long time. As things got better I wanted to create things that would put people in a good mood, that would make people laugh. With that in mind we went out of our way to create Giraffe o'Clock.

Watching people laughing their asses off while playing the game on stream has really made my last few days. Thank you all so much <3 Game development is amazing and I love all of the submissions I've tried so far, looking forward to trying even more!

Here's a GIF of a dancing giraffe just one more time.

Thank you for reading this serious message.

You know these people who say games are for kids? Get them out!

Games are amazing, they come in many forms and shapes, and many of them can have a great impact on people's lives! Games like Celeste teach you to never give up, games like League of Legends turn you into a toxic person (huehue), games like Ori and the Blind forest show you have to see beauty in everything. Many, many games make a great impact on people! With that sad, I've also seen people get impacted by Ludum Dare games. These make for some beautiful moments!

Have you've seen strong reactions to games?

For me, this is my favourite the entire game jam! FlyingKaida playing Giraffe o'Clock

https://clips.twitch.tv/AgreeableColdbloodedSowHoneyBadger-jS2UUfG5gkokNVZr

Thank you for allowing me to share this with the community, FlyingKaida <3

Also, check out her game! This was her very first game jam! Outrun the Darkness - a cute little endless runner... as long as your flashlight has batteries!